On Feminist Jurisprudence: Radical Feminism and the Construction of the Self
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Authors
Castle, Patrick
Issue Date
2007
Type
Thesis
Language
en_US
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Abstract
Radical feminist jurisprudence rightly criticizes liberal feminist jurisprudence for
its restrictive focus upon formal rights and guarantees of equality. Such legal provisions
do not by themselves dismantle discrimination against women, which is more deeply
located in social practices, institutional provisions, and cultural patterns of
interpretation. In short, radical feminists argue their liberal sisters underestimate what
patriarchy is and how it functions. While formal legal guarantees are a necessary
condition of dismantling patriarchal discrimination, social practices and cultural
patterns of interpretation maintain conditions that prevent those rights from being
exercised.
While this is undoubtedly an accomplishment, radical feminism focuses on gaining
power over social, economic, and institutional resources. This Neo-Marxian notion of
power is at odds with the way in which postmodern feminists have analyzed how
patriarchy functions. For such postmodernfeminists, patriarchal power "constitutes" or
"configures" female "subjectivities" and hence functions in more nefarious fashion than
radical feminists presume. I argue that radical feminists can easily incorporate this
insight into the formation of personal identities without embracing the postmodern
conception of power, which compromises the possibility of critical agency. In this way,
radical feminism incorporates the insight of both liberal and postmodern feminism
without incurring their liabilities.
Description
75 p.
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